The Kenyan president, Uhuru Kenyatta, met the opposition leader, Raila Odinga, in public for the first time since last year’s disputed elections, with the pair promising to heal the country’s divisions.

A Bahraini Arabic-language daily newspaper affiliated to the ruling Al Khalifah dynasty has claimed that the three pro-democracy campaigners recently shot dead by regime forces in the Persian Gulf waters were killed in Eastern Ghouta near the Syrian capital city of Damascus.

Egyptian forces have arrested a former presidential candidate who has called for a boycott of the upcoming presidential elections as Cairo speeds up its repression campaign against those challenging President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi’s reelection bid.

A political coalition including several high-profile Egyptians sharply criticized President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi for a speech in which he warned off anyone seeking to challenge his rule, amid growing calls for a boycott of presidential elections.

In a ceremony that Kenya's government warned would be treason, opposition leader Raila Odinga on Tuesday was sworn in as "the people's president" during a mock inauguration protesting President Uhuru Kenyatta's new term after months of deadly election turmoil.

Election officials in Honduras rejected the opposition's appeal demanding the annulment of President Juan Orlando Hernandez's re-election, which was lodged over voter fraud allegations in the bitterly disputed poll.

Honduras's leftwing opposition called for a month of protests and possible insurrection to reject President Juan Orlando Hernandez's claim to have won re-election in a bitterly disputed poll held in November.

Venezuela's fractured opposition said Friday it planned to drop competing agendas to unify behind a single candidate in the 2018 presidential elections in which leader Nicolas Maduro is seeking a new mandate.

Members of Venezuela’s government and opposition coalition failed to reach a deal in a new round of talks in the Dominican Republic on Saturday aimed at resolving the OPEC nation’s protracted political crisis, but planned to meet in two weeks to try again.